


Cooking Attempts

by rinstop



Series: Prompt fills [38]
Category: Free!
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-20
Updated: 2016-03-20
Packaged: 2018-05-27 23:40:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 894
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6304741
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rinstop/pseuds/rinstop
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Nagisa tries and fails and Rin doesn't care</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cooking Attempts

He could hear the loud beeping from outside, the obnoxious repitition grating on his ears through the walls of the apartment even before he had opened the door. But he wasn’t sure whether to be worried or not until he entered the apartment and found himself walking into a cloud of smoke, spreading from the kitchen and rising to collect near the ceiling. The concern that took hold of him was instant. 

“Nagisa?! Nagisa, are you ok?” He covered his mouth with one hand, waving the other in front of his face in a futile attempt to clear the smoke, peering through the grey to find the other as he moved further into the flat. Already his eyes were watering and he coughed as the acrid taste caught in his throat. 

He found Nagisa in the kitchen, perched on the top step of a little ladder, desperately waving a towel under the smoke detector in a bid to make it stop it’s awful cacophony. All of the windows were open, the vent was on full power, whirring loudly and furiously as if it was trying to outmatch the sound of the smoke alarm. A quick glance gave him an overview of the cause of the situation - a smoking pot on the stove top that looked like something had boiled over, dried up and started crusting on the sides, and the open door of the oven releasing smoke from the charred remains of…something. Rin suspected identifying what it was would be a forensic investigation in itself. 

“What…?”

“Ah, Rin-chan!” Nagisa flapped the towel a few more times until, finally, the alarm stopped beeping. “I wanted to make you dinner! It was going to be amazing and I had the perfect recipe but then I smelt burning and the oven had smoke coming out so I opened it and the meat was burned really black! So I took it out and cut it but it was raw in the middle and I thought if I cut the burnt bits off and put it back it would be fine and I was doing that but then the pot was rattling and I took off the lid and it whooshed up and spilt all over the side and then the smoke alarm went off!!”

He was still standing on top of the ladder. flailing his arms as he gesticulated, the towel flapping too. The kitchen was a mess - not just the burnt food, but all of the prep work Rin could see Nagisa had done scattered over the counter, various patches of spilled somethings. On Nagisa too, though the apron saved most of him, but Rin could see streaks of green and red and white on his arms, on his face, in his hair. His face was red from exertion and he’d puffed his cheeks out, chipmunk-like in his frustration. 

Rin couldn’t help it. He shouldn’t find the situation funny but the chuckles rose from his throat and, even though he tried to keep his mouth shut and still, he couldn’t contain them. They escaped, quiet chuckles rising to deep belly laughter that had him bent over and struggling to breathe. 

“Are you laughing at me, Rin-chan?! It’s not funny!!”

That only made him laugh harder. It was just so…so Nagisa, to go so big so early when the most he usually made was fried rice or noodles. And to fail so spectacularly that he almost burnt the whole place down. Something about it reminded him of when they were young, when Nagisa had been trying to learn butterfly and all Rin could see was furiously enthusiastic splashing. 

As his laughter ceded, a surge of fondess washed over him, for Nagisa, for his zeal and deterrmination. ‘Go big or go home’ was probably the motto he lived by. It was incredibly sweet of him to try something like this. 

He grinned up at Nagisa, still standing with chipmunk cheeks on the ladder, arms akimbo. He looked incredibly cute. So, with a firm grip around his waist, he lowered him from the ladder with a twirl and held him close, pressing his face in his curly, golden hair. It smelled of smoke, but that didn’t matter. 

“Sorry. I didn’t mean to laugh. You didn’t have to do this, you know?”

Nagisa’s voice was muffled against his neck. “It’s your last night in Japan before you go back to Australia. I wanted to do something special with you, Rin-chan.” 

“Thanks, Nagisa.” The smile that brought to his face was soft and gentle. “Actually, I was going to surprise you with it, but I booked a table at Maison Pierre. It’s your birthday in a few weeks and since I won’t be in the country, I thought….”

Nagisa jerked back to look at him, eyes wide and shining. “The french restaurant with the desserts?! Rin-chan, I’ve been staring in through the window for months!”

“I know!” he laughed, “But you have to promise to eat a proper main course first - we’re not skipping straight to dessert!”

It was a sign of how excited Nagisa was that he didn’t even think to contest that, the way he usually would. Instead he kissed Rin, deep and fervent in a way that left them both breathless. 

“I knew there was a reason I loved you, Rin-chan, and it wasn’t just your good-looks!”


End file.
